US Rapprochement with Laos and Cambodia: A Response‪.‬

Professor Thayer cites three main areas of cooperation that have influenced US rapprochement with Laos: the Missing in Action/ Prisoner of War (MIA/POW) issue, reduction of opium production and counter-terrorism. As he rightly contends, the MIA issue remains at the top of America's agenda in Laos. To date, 240 sets of remains of American service personnel have been found and identified; the search, led by US teams with Lao logistical support, for a further 355 MIAs continues. (1) Positive collaboration on this issue has unquestionably helped to improve relations between the two countries. However, another legacy--unexploded ordnance (UXO)--of the war constitutes a greater concern for the Lao government. In 2009, the United States committed around $5 million to UXO clearance and training programmes. Though the funding represents one of the largest US aid budgets in Laos in that year and an increase from the previous year's $3.5 million, it still falls short of what is required. As recently as July 2010, in a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a group of former US Ambassadors to Laos called on the United States to make an annual commitment of $10 million over the next ten years for UXO removal in Laos. It may well be true that Laos agreed to cooperate with the US on the MIA issue in order to get the latter's assistance to clear the country's rural areas of UXO, although one may argue that Laos has the moral right to request this help. From 1964 to 1973 US aircraft dropped over two million tons of ordnance during nearly 600,000 bombing missions over the country. (2) At the end of the war, it was estimated that 78 million unexploded cluster bomblets littered the country's rural areas. (3) A recent survey by the National Regulatory Authority (NRA) for the UXO/Mine Action sector in Laos indicates that some 50,000 people were maimed or killed by UXO between 1964 and 2008. (4) Counter-narcotics operations also remain a US priority in Laos. With the significant decline of opium cultivation, the flow of, and addiction to, methamphetamines and amphetamines have emerged as another front in the US anti-drugs struggle in Laos, though the country is considered less as a site of production than as a pivotal transit area between Myanmar, Thailand and China. On the other hand, counter-terrorism, another US priority in Southeast Asia, is unlikely to generate much opportunity for cooperation between the two countries: Laos is not known for being a place of shelter for individuals or groups that may be classified as terrorists or having international terrorist connections. In other words, the United States does not have to devote many resources to cover Laos in its global campaign against terrorism.